What is climate awareness?
Climate change has become a part of our daily reality. Yet, many people still struggle to understand its dimensions, what’s being done to combat it and how they can help. Raising awareness about climate change among your employees involves providing them with the resources and training they need to take action, as well as what you’re doing to make your business more climate-friendly.
The benefits of raising climate awareness
Greater awareness is the first step to change. Before you take on a project to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, you need to get your employees on board. Communicating to them why your company is taking these steps will increase your chances of success.
Your commitment to the climate could also inspire your employees and increase their job satisfaction. Many people are attracted to companies that are willing to act on climate change. Taking action could make your company’s brand more attractive.
Positive impact on your business
Employee satisfaction
Attract the next generation of employees by demonstrating your commitment to the climate and the environment.
Employer brand
Promoting climate best practices in your business helps build a responsible reputation.
Operation optimization
Better climate awareness could lead to employees giving valuable feedback to optimize your daily operations.
Roadmap to raising climate awareness in your business
Communicate your plans and progress
Employees need to understand why climate action is important and how your company is participating. Start by sharing your climate plan with them along with concrete examples and initiatives. Then, regularly keep employees informed on your progress and share success stories to stay on track. Regularly seek your employees’ feedback.
Don’t forget that change usually comes with resistance. But if you have a clear climate plan, you will also become more attractive to new employees who want to work for a company with environmental values.
Find climate champions
Find climate champions who will lead by example and help build momentum. These employees can be your eyes and ears on the ground and help you find improvements or tweaks to make. They can also respond to climate-related concerns of colleagues and offer ideas of actions to undertake. For example, if you are switching to electric trucks or retrofitting your building, your climate champions could help ease the transition period by advocating for the change to the rest of your team.
Develop a climate campaign
Further raise awareness by providing resources on best practices for reducing GHG emissions at work and home. If you can, hire a climate expert or reach out to non-profits to guide awareness raising efforts and training on making your activities more carbon neutral.
A campaign is a fun way to raise awareness and rally employees to your goals. Your climate champions can also participate in designing the campaign—organizing events, holding contests, and sharing success stories and progress updates. Even if you don’t have a big project coming up, you can hold a contest for the best idea for saving energy or share stories about employees who switched to transit or cycling to commute.
Update performance management
You can use SMART environmental sustainability related objectives as part of your performance management system for managers and frontline employees to further raise awareness of the importance of these issues. To do this fairly, you will need to set achievable targets and then measure your progress over time. Create a climate action plan with a manageable list of projects and a realistic timeline to get your team involved.
Find the right grant for your climate action
Discover our list of over 60 governmental active grants, tax credits and loan programs to support the environmental initiatives of Canadian businesses.
Resources
Government of Canada: Climate Change
Find information on Canada’s actions, climate future, partnerships, adaptation, health, science, and emissions reporting.
B Lab: Free B Corp assessment tool
An online questionnaire to examine your businesses’ environmental performance and the impact of your products or services.
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